Simone Williams, Jailah Long and Darrell Morton
Republic Airways, an Indianapolis-based regional passenger airline, made a St. Patrick’s Day donation of $20,000 to support the University of Maryland Eastern Shore’s aviation science program.
The gift will be used to provide scholarships for students, underwrite their travel and participation in professional aviation events, and support advanced faculty and flight instructor training.
“Our goal with the donation,” said Darrell Morton, Republic’s senior manager of education programs and diversity partnerships, “is to make sure we are connected (with universities) and inspire the next generation to consider a career in aviation.”
Morton joined Republic in August 2021 and learned quickly about UMES’ aviation science program, which primarily produces graduates who opt to become pilots or choose a management-track career path.
On hand to accept the ceremonial check was President Heidi M. Anderson, who told the five-member delegation from Republic “this is one of our niche programs, and our goal is to make it soar.”
In his role of cultivating diversity partnerships, Morton said he’s particularly interested in learning what historically Black institutions with aviation programs need to keep pace with training the industry’s next generation of employees.
While the number of minorities who pilot commercial airlines is relatively low, Morton said Republic’s overarching goal is to find “what we can do to get (young people) involved in the aviation industry.”
Among Republic representatives on hand for the ceremony was 2010 UMES alumna Simone Williams, a Washington, D.C-based recruiter for the airline.
Republic initially reached out to UMES in 2021 and the university crafted several suggestions on what it might do if a donation was forthcoming.
About half of the $20,000 donation will be set aside for financial aid.
“It is envisioned five-to-10 scholarships of $1,000 – $2,000 will be distributed to (aviation science) students … allocated evenly between aviation management and professional pilot concentration students.”
“Selection criteria for scholarships,” UMES’ proposal reads, will take into account “student need, academic performance, community and program impact, faculty recommendations.”
1st officer Starr and UMES’ Dr. Willie Brown
Financial aid for aviation science students is key to helping many achieve costly industry certification in some aviation fields, which requires a substantial amount of training beyond UMES’ curriculum.
Dr. Willie L. Brown, an associate professor of engineering and aviation sciences who helped in hosting the check-presentation ceremony, said his faculty colleagues would like to see some of the donation used to underwrite participation in the National Intercollegiate Flying Association team competition to help UMES students hone skills they’ll need when they graduation.
With two uniformed Republic pilots looking on, Morton said “we want to hire pilots,” then added “we have all kinds of jobs.”
In November 2021, Alaska Air Group stepped forward as a corporate supporter of UMES’ aviation science program with a pledge to help student-pilots earn commercial airline pilot certification, a lengthy and expensive training task.
